Tim Wright – UK
Tim Wright is a musician, composer and video artist based in York. He is perhaps best known as a producer of peculiarly individual electronic dance music released under his own name and the pseudonym Tube Jerk. His music has been released by some of the key labels in the field including Tresor, Novamute, Sativae and GPR. His recordings in the early 1990s as Germ for GPR are considered to have been pioneering in the then nascent IDM scene. Innovative and uncompromising, surreal and often disorientating, Germ offered glimpses of possible musical futures which have never been fully realised.
In recent years Tim has in some respects returned to his experimental roots and has been exploring generative and algorithmic approaches to audio visual composition.
http://www.myspace.com/tubejerk

Participation The Film & Video Workshop Movement 1979 – 1991

140 Heath Mill Lane  Birmingham  B9 4AR
Opening Times:
Thu 02 July – Sat 01 Aug 2009 | open Thu-Sat, 12-5 PM | admission FREE
www.vivid.org.uk

Participation is an exhibition and archive project centred on the emergence of new film forms, politics and practices in the 1980s. Unearthing the archives of challenging, polemical and oppositional groups operating during a period of economic and social upheaval, the works presented react to and document the rise of Thatcherism and the social and cultural events the period from 1979 engendered: inner city disturbances, the miners strike, and increasing social disparity.

Presented in two parts, Participation brings us rarely seen works from key film and video workshops and groups who, motivated by a desire to effect social change, forged new approaches to political and social themes that emerged nationally. The show includes works by Amber Films, Black Audio Film Collective and Sankofa amongst others, and has a special focus on the Birmingham Film and Video Workshop.

VIVID is a leading media arts agency committed to the development of media arts practice through research, production and commissioning programmes.

 VIVID’s space is open to the public for a wide range of activities including exhibitions, talks and screenings and the programme aims to reflect the development of artist’s film and video through a juxtaposition of historical and contemporary practice.

The Outcrowd are a group of like-minded image-makers. There work can be seen as an expression of these artists compulsion to create. Fundamentally, the artists all share an essential motivation to explore the possibilities of enhancing everyday life by making magic from the mundane. There work utilises modest and direct means including works in pencil, paint and ink along with photographic works, which record and celebrate everyday happenstances.

Specifically, what comes to the fore are common concerns and a positive interest with dipping into the past and championing seemingly long-forgotten notions such as thriftiness and a delight in the ordinary everyday detritus of life.

This year their process is applied to exhibiting in sheds, modifying and re-claiming these gentle relics over the duration of the festival.  Come join them as they attempt to cheekily subvert the traditional gallery setting.

www.outcrowdcollective.blogspot.com

Ex members of Burning Witch, Mr Bungle and the legendary Accused together they create the heaviest, sludge-doom known to man and destroy all pretenders in their path. This really is the sound of hell breaking loose and swallowing everything around it, until there is a black nothingness…
www.myspace.com/asvaband 

Their music is beautiful and at the same time desolate featuring the sound of lonely highways, wide-open spaces and the occasional slide guitar. They are so far ahead of the pack it will take years for people to catch up with them. This is music to get totally immersed in; it’s melodic, powerful yet understated and reserved.
www.myspace.com/earthofficial

Members of Godflesh and Sally in a powered up shoegaze band. This is blissed out pop with nods to MBV, Mary Chain, as well as post rock flourishes and the odd bit of Sister era Sonic Youth. Nice intricate time changes with nods to 20th century composer Steve Reich but with a sense of urgency missing from most so called post rock bands.
www.myspace.com/einstellung

Spazzy math rock meets new wave and electronica. These aren’t some glum bedroom; chin stroking boys with a downer on life. They want to dance and they want to make you dance to their synth heavy, post rock disco party and dance you will my friends, dance you will.
www.myspace.com/weareerrors

As monikers go, none could be more fitting for this group of individuals than Fucked Up. Front man Pink Eyes has been known to maim himself with bottles, microphones, and light bulbs, bleeding from his head as frenzied audience members throw themselves at the stage – and each other – with reckless abandon.

A real coup for Supersonic. Stephen O’Malley with his band of merry men, Julian Cope, Australian guitarist Oren Ambarchi and Hungarian vocal shaman Attila Csihar on stage for a special performance shrouded in mystery and dry ice.
www.myspace.com/stephenomalley

Legendary krautrock pioneers Michael Rother, Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius –who have played in Kraftwerk, Neu! and Cluster – produced two albums in their three-year existence. This year they released a live album recorded in 1974 and has reunited for a series of shows. They sound as fresh as any work by their krautrock-influenced peers of today. Lengthy motorik grooves that have an enveloping momentum makes it feel like they could, or indeed should, go on forever.

feat. Merzbow & Keiji Haino
Two legendary Japanese noise giants playing together. Haino plays guitar, percussion, and a Theremin-like device while Merzbow plays his computer filled with his own noise/feedback samples. This is the sound of someone that wants to scare you to the point where your heart actually stops beating.
merzbow.net

Tundra manages to combine that spazzy, glitchy electronica sound with sweet songwriting that leans heavily towards pop sensibilities. This is absolutely made for the more discerning dance floor and should be an absolute treat this weekend.
www.myspace.com/maxtundra

Spanish doom sludge with a healthy nod to early 70’s prog as well as to Sleep and Sabbath. Vocals are low in the mix and near indecipherable while the hypnotic bass and drums rumble gives way to passages of pure 70’s metal. Glorious.
www.myspace.com/orthodoxband

Excitement levels are set for ten as Brooklyn’s Parts and Labor play Supersonic for the first time. Comprising amazing hardcore noise punk with actual songs you can sing along to while soaring vocal harmonies, squealing keyboards and horns all fight to be heard from within the frantic drumming. This is a beautiful noise that has its roots in early hardcore (melodies a la Husker Du) but also has a sound that’s bang up to date. Miss them at your peril.
www.myspace.com/partsandlabor

Creating epic instrumental songs that are given room to breath they allow you to fully immerse yourself in their world. Red Sparowes are brutally heavy and have no need to rely on any hackneyed riff to pummel you into submission. Their cascading sound owes as much to Goblin as it does to Sabbath.
www.myspace.com/redsparowes

Big Rough Trade faves here.
Veering between krautrock edginess and bittersweet pop melancholia, droning medicated tones and noise driven fuzz, The Oscillation recalls the kosmische musik of Neu! and Tangerine Dream interpreted with an eye on Pil’s dubbed out punk funk, Miles Davis’ experimentalism and Spacemen 3’s strung out song writing
www.myspace.com/theoscillations

The new project of musician producer Kevin Laska ( Novatron ) and long time Justin K Broadrick and Kevin Martin collaborator Dave Cochrane. Combining crushing atmospheres through a mixture of electronic ambience, mangling bass lines and distorted epic layers of textured guitar, injected with driving rhythms and effected vocal phrasing. Laska and Cochrane build discordant worlds on an immense scale before pulling you down to another level of fear and ethereal bliss before kicking off with some more soul dismantling sonic disfunction
www.myspace.com/transitionaluk

Whilst the spectrum will produce a varied array of sounds that are pleasing to the ear there is a darker side to its operation. The capability to create a more unconventional sound is limitless. Everything you will see and hear is derived from a steep and logistic learning curve. Peek, Poke and Merge
www.myspace.com/zxspectrumorchestra

His music is fragile, soothing, dark and melodic. Using tape loops and banks of Fx pedals he creates soundscapes to get lost in and is certainly someone you want to revisit time and time again.
www.myspace.com/alexanderdtucker

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When they first played Supersonic in 2005 people were excited; mainly because of one EP and the pedigree of earlier bands these chaps had been in. That afternoon they blew people away with a crushing set that stayed just the right side of improv and became the talk of the festival. One critically acclaimed album later they are now the toast of the town. Live is where these guys excel, Stanier’s drums alone can stove your head in, combine that with the finest musicianship and a desire to make you think, as well as dance, and Battles could well be the most perfect band to headline Supersonic.
www.myspace.com/battlestheband

These Brummie wonders impressed the Capsule grannies enough to make them cough up the moolah to release their first EP. Anyone that has seen them live knows they are as unpredictable and in your face as any band could be. They offer nods to Jesus Lizard with hints of San Diego art punks Heroin and Antioch Arrow. It’s old school, honest, in-your-face punk rock with enough balls and attitude to satisfy even the most jaded.
www.myspace.com/beestunglips1

Formed in Glasgow by Russell McEwan as a solo, sample-based project inspired by Scorn, later recruiting guitarist Kevin Hare and the addition of bass guitarist Graeme Leggate, they became the bastard offspring of early Swans meets Khanate. Utterly brutal doom with dual vocals and heavily repetitive riffs that just shatter your skull.
www.myspace.com/legionofblacksun 

The beauty of Supersonic is that for every riff monger lurking on stage, there are always a number of hidden gems to discover that you would normally just pass on. Cath & Phil are just one of these fantastic finds. Avant folk with a nod to the more traditional folk scene, this is the kind of music that you would find at old American carnie performances while a parade of freaks dance in front of you. Sweet music with lyrics so disturbing even Slayer can’t touch em and in short an absolute treat.
www.myspace.com/cptyl

A ten-piece band that uses a myriad of instruments to create a wholly original sound you can listen to on record all day long but never get a sense of how magical they are live. It’s chamber music but not as you know it. It’s upbeat and full of life with a sense of hope and optimism.
www.myspace.com/efterklang